Posted
by
timothy
on Sunday April 20, 2014 @07:29AM
from the you-can't-divorce-politics-from-government dept.

Hugh Pickens DOT Com (2995471) writes "The Christian Science Monitor reports that once again, the Obama administration has pushed back a final decision on the controversial Keystone XL pipeline possibly delaying the final determination until after the November midterm elections. In announcing the delay, the State Department cited a Nebraska Supreme Court case that could affect the route of the pipeline that may not be decided until next year, as well as additional time needed to review 2.5 million public comments on the project. Both supporters and opponents of the pipeline criticized the delay as a political ploy. Democratic incumbents from oil-rich states have urged President Obama to approve the pipeline but approving the pipeline before the election could staunch the flow of money from liberal donors and fund-raisers who oppose the project. The Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell said in a statement that "at a time of high unemployment in the Obama economy, it's a shame that the administration has delayed the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline for years." Activists say its construction could devastate the environment, but several State Department reviews have concluded that the pipeline would be safe and was unlikely to significantly increase the rate of carbon pollution in the atmosphere. Even if the pipeline was canceled, it said, the oil sands crude was likely to be extracted and brought to market by other means, such as rail, and then processed and burned."

What you fail to realize is that most of them could care less if the oil companies get rich or not. They are more concerned with controlling you and getting your vote. The evil oil companies is just a windmill for you to tilt at while they cheer you on claiming to do something about it while you gladly vote for them.

Mitch McConnell is a riot. Always when the turtleman speaks one should verify the facts and when you look at the data [transcanada.com] from no other than TransCanada about the number of *permanent* jobs this specific pipleline will add to the US economy it tops out at around 3600. Meanwhile you have Americans suing to not have that pipeline cross their land or have their land commandeered by the federal government.

North Dakota has saturated rail and road traffic trying to get it's crude out of the state. At the same time Natural gas is simply being burned off because there's no pipeline infrastructure to transport it. Pipelines that were being used to transport natural gas to the midwest from the east coast and gulf states will no longer be able to be used next year because they are being converted for use in transporting chemicals needed for tar sand conversion in Canada.

The reason big oil companies want the pipeline from Canada and not North Dakota is because there's a multibillion dollar tax loophole related to foreign oil processed in US refineries for export. Which is why the pipeline runs to the coast. Keystone Excel will have no effect on US fuel prices because it's not designed to sell fuel on the US market. It's quite likely that Keystone will result in refining capacity being taken out of the US market as it's used for export. All the signs point to this project actually costing the tax payer more at the pump in the end.

Let's also not forget the natural gas problems this creates for the upper midwest. They currently get their natural gas from Canada. Tar sand production need incredible amounts of natural gas. That's expected to increase prices people will be paying to heat their home. At the same time there's no plans now or in the future to bring more natural gas to upper midwest from the east coast. If anything they are losing capacity in order to support the tar sand production.

I would have loved to been a fly on the wall in Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper's office when this non-decision was announced. Obama has once again taken the cowardly way out and punted a tough decision. He wants to continue to fundraise from environmentalists by saying "We're being tough on the Keystone pipeline and insisting it meets our environmental standards!" and then do the same with the big business crowd by saying, "We haven't said no to Keystone, we just want to make sure it meets our environmental standards." He doesn't actually want to make the decision, because then one crowd or the other will tell him to pound sand. Even though the entire job of being President of the United States is about making those decisions!

"People who showed up to help Bundy in Nevada are domestic terrorists" - Harry Reid"People complaining they are having issues with Obamacare are outright liars" - Harry Reid"The only reason to oppose Obama is because of racism" - Jimmy Carter"People protesting against the ACA were waving their flags around like Nazis" - Nancy Pelosi"Help me to get reelected to destroy my political enemies" - Barak Obama

Lets see. I can list a ton of quotes from the LEADERS of the DNC. If you want I'll go on and list some from Bill Maher that you won't be able to match from anyone on the right. Perhaps you can show examples of the GOP doing the same? No? For how bad they are you can't find anything?

Perhaps if you weren't such a twat you would see that the partsianship is being instigated from the leadership of the DNC, period.

Self-correcting is relative to time. Many make the assumption that the time base is short and so destructive policies will have relatively immediate consequences. This is what confuses the global climate debate and the argument that when it gets hot enough, we'll switch to something non-carbon based. If the time base is short, that might work. However, if what we pump now means a runaway greenhouse effect 20-30 years from now, then we're screwed 20-30 years from now and no amount of "market forces" will fix that.

Keystone is at best a waste for America and at worst a natural disaster waiting to happen. It's a pipeline down to Mexican refineries so Canada can sell cheap tar sands oil to China. The problem is it's a _long_ pipe line, and they have a history of breaking and nobody noticing (since it costs lots of $$$ to monitor them) until after a community's ground water is heavily contaminated. If it happens in a mid sized town or city where it's too expensive to buy everyone out those people are just screwed.

The problem is these sorts of things are only a matter of time. With current tech maintenance costs more than allowing the disaster to happen. If the companies were severely punished for the spills that wouldn't be an issue. But if BP had to clean up their last mess they wouldn't exist as a company, and the owners would be broke. Those guys just buy off politicians until their in the clear. Heck, the CEO of TEP cried a little on Camera and got away with giving thousands of people cancer because he wouldn't pay to upgrade the safety on his factory. It was called a "Once in a 100 year event", but there were records showing it had been 100 years since the last one. That's some Mighty fine work there, Lou.

So to summarize my rant: You're asking me, as an American, to take a big risk that sooner or later is practically guaranteed to end in an etiological disaster in exchange for at best a few thousand jobs and a bit of cheap oil for China? I think This [google.com] just about sums up my feelings.

Nuclear is a fairly startling breaktrough, although it uses steam for power generation. And solar. Get fusion working, and it will be a big change (but again, it will use steam).

There are ways to directly generate electricity from fusion reactions. Lawrence Livermore Laboratories actually demonstrated it in the lab and came out with greater than 85% efficiency from this system (heat-based systems max out near 50%). Before I'm criticized for even mentioning it, yes, it's more complicated and difficult that just hooking up a turbine. It's still feasible, and should not be dismissed out-of-hand as an area of research in fusion power generation. In the long run, it would be much cheaper.